Keep Your Powder Dry

Another briefly mentioned regiment gets it's fifteen minutes of fame. Originally I had them labelled as Colonel Edward Aldrich's Regiment of Foot I realised that they were in fact flying the colours of Lord Saye and Sele's Regiment, albeit with an incorrect pattern of devices. Aldrich's Regiment grew out of Lord Saye and Sele's so they were sort of vaguely right but the level of wrongness bothered me. Lawks amercy guv'nor! I'm becoming a button counter!  Brushwork on these by Alan Tuckey, basing by my own fair hand. So they now sport a new movement tray, and correct colours for the third captain's company of Lord Saye and Sele's Regiment of Foot. Raised in 1642 they fought at Edgehill, were besieged at Banbury and were present at the Turnham Green standoff. Late in 1642, Sir John Meldrum took over command as Colonel and the Regiment was possibly at Marlow and Wokingham; they were definitely at the First Siege of Newark and we...

The last of the "that's a cracking discount, must buy a big expansion for 2020" figures - which turned out to be 13 Regiments of Horse, 4 Regiments of Foot, some mule trains, and a few bits and bobs. I will of course continue to document my older units, which appeared only briefly on the blog. Sir Lewis Dyve raised a Regiment of Foot in late 1642. They were part of the King's Oxford army and fought at  Edgehill, possibly Aylesbury, Turnham Green (if they were at Turnham Green, one would presume that they were present at Brentford also), First Newbury, Cropredy, Lostwithiel, Second Newbury, Dorchester, Blandford, Weymouth, and the siege of Sherborne Castle. A Parliamentarian newspaper report describes four white coated regiments at Aldbourne Chase muster on April 10th 1644: there were a number of regiments present at the muster, and we know their coat colours (which weren't white) apart from four - Dyve's, Cooke's, Duke of York's and Bernard Astl...

One of the most represented regiments in the history of ECW miniatures painting; ranking alongside Hesilrigge's lobsters, Newcastle's lambs, and Rupert's blewcoats. Why's that I hear the uninitiated I say? The answer is "purple". Who in their right mind is going to paint yet another Venetian red coated regiment when you can paint one in purple coats? Robert Greville, 2nd Baron Brooke, raised two Regiments of Foot. One was raised in Warwickshire to fight in the midlands: the other shortlived regiment, was raised to serve in the Earl of Essex's army in 1642. The Regiment that fought with Essex is the one represented here, and is also the one that wore purple coats. They are believed to have flown purple colours with mullet (stars) devices; we do not know what colour these stars were, but heraldic convention would have them or (gold - so in reality yellow) or argent (silver - white). We don't know if Lord Brooke's midland regiment (th...

The last of the current batch of cavalry. Can't wait to paint something in 'not-brown'™ paint for a change. Lord Hopton’s cavalry cornet was noted by Symonds (1644) as red, fringed red and white, with a cannon discharging in gold and a motto in gold letters above: Hopton was General of Artillery to Prince Maurice, so a rather fitting cornet device. Sir Ralph, Lord Hopton was the Royalist commander of the King's army in the west country. He raised a Troop of Horse in Somerset, in July 1642. The Regiment fought st Sherborne Castle, Braddock Down, Beacon Hill, Sourton Down, Lansdown, Bristol (the Troop had expanded sometime about now, and become a fully fledged Regiment), First Newbury, Cheriton, Second Newbury, the relief of Donnington Castle, Langport, Torrington before  surrendering at Truro in March 1646. Sir Ralph was an interesting fellow: as a 21 year old he undertook the C17th equivalent of a gap year, but instead of travelling to 'fin...

The latest unit to have their fifteen minutes fame: first appearing, very briefly, in one of the first posts to appear on the blog. The Earl of Manchester raised a Regiment of Dragoons to serve in the Eastern Association in Essex in 1643. In early 1644 they were active in the Newark area taking part in both the siege and battle at Newark. April 1644 command passed to John Lilburne as Manchester had effectively been promoted: he had been given control of the Eastern Association's finances (previously the Earl of Essex had ultimate military authority over all of Parliament's forces), Under Lilburne's command the Regiment marched to join the Siege of York; five companies fought at Marston Moor (where their previous colonel, Manchester, distinguished himself by remaining upon the battlefield whilst almost every other senior commander had disappeared). They were involved in the taking of Tickhill castle, the Siege of Knaresborough, possibly at the Siege of ...

The Earl of Northampton's Regiment of Horse had a number of troops - detachments garrisoned Banbury, whilst the large part of the Regiment fought with the King's Oxford Army. Originally led by the Second Earl, command would pass to his son (along with the title) after Hopton Heath. The Second Earl Spencer Compton was a great friend of Charles I, then the Prince of Wales and would be one of two bearers of his ceremonial train at his coronation. He commanded the Royalist forces against Gell's Parliamentarians at Hopton Heath; routing the Parliamentarian cavalry and capturing eight pieces of artillery. Just as victory seemed assured, his arrogance got the better of him: he found himself too far forward, isolated and surrounded, and to make matters worse his horse stumbled, having fallen foul of a rabbit hole. Parliamentarian soldiers offered him quarter, but he refused to accept quarter from "base rogues and rebels". And so he was killed by a blow to t...

The spotlight falls on another regiment that got just the briefest of mentions back in the midst of time when the blog was starting out. A regiment of foot from the time of the Commonwealth, so a bit of an oddity when you look at the rest of my units. This Colonel Charles Fairfax is not to be confused with Black Tom's brother, Charles, who was killed at Marston Moor. This Charles was Tom's uncle, and was the younger brother of Ferdinando Fairfax. Charles is possibly more notable for writing and researching 'Analecta Fairfaxiana', a genealogy of the Fairfax family and all their offshoots. The document is now held at Leeds University library. Prior to Marston Moor Parliament's general staff held a planning meeting at Charles's house, the table at which they met survives and is now at Farnley Hall near Leeds*. Raised in Yorkshire in 1648 they participated in the Preston campaign. After Preston they besieged Pontefract Castle, eventually t...

In the seemingly endless production line of harquebusiers it is a great relief to paint some cuirassiers. Please read the next paragraph in the style of Dervla Kirwan's M&S food advert voiceovers Now these aren't your run of the mill Hasselrigg's "housewives' favourite, should have been a racehorse"* Lobsters. No, these are the Marquis of Argyll's Lifeguard cuirassiers. [/end Dervla Kirwan voice] A troop consisting initially of gentlemen volunteers, possibly equipped as cuirassiers, forming Argyll’s Lifeguard. The word 'possibly' is good enough for me, because who doesn't love a cuirassier unit? Their regimental history reads pretty much as 'quartered at..' punctuated occasionally by 'possibly at..'. At some time in 1645 they accepted the surrender of Lindisfarne, but spent the rest of their time serving in Scotland. Argyll was present at the battles of Fyvie, Inverlochy and Kilsyth, but no specific menti...

In a severe bout of 'what to paint next' I added some command figures to my Parliamentarian and Royalist armies. As the manufacturer of my figures only makes a limited number of 'generals' I had to deploy my trusty headswapping skillz to try and make them look a little different. I have become a little hung up on detail recently and now strive to have the correct coloured hair/horses/etc for the real life commanders that my figures represent. We are blessed that there are a number of portraits to use for reference; unfortunately some portraits are proving rather difficult to track down (if they exist at all), which is where the use of lobster pot helmets comes in very handy. First up three men of Parliament . Lieutenant General James Wemyss : who was an interesting fellow. A master gunner, he was captured at Cropredy Bridge. Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex : commander of Parliament's forces until he stepped down in 1645 due to the publication...